{"id":29878,"date":"2021-08-26T23:26:37","date_gmt":"2021-08-27T03:26:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=29878"},"modified":"2021-08-26T23:33:35","modified_gmt":"2021-08-27T03:33:35","slug":"meet-your-candidates-harold-kim-conservative-newmarket-aurora","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/meet-your-candidates-harold-kim-conservative-newmarket-aurora\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet Your Candidates: Harold Kim (Conservative, Newmarket-Aurora)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In his two successful bids for a place on Aurora Council, Harold Kim ran on a slogan of \u201cservant leadership,\u201d that is working for and being accountable to the people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although the Conservative Party has a slogan of its own, this original mantra is close at hand as Mr. Kim hits the campaign trail to turn Newmarket-Aurora blue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn terms of my beliefs and how I work, my mantra is still the same,\u201d says Mr. Kim. \u201cWe lead by example, we serve by doing and it is not just lording over people; it\u2019s about service.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, however, Mr. Kim says he has to follow the party\u2019s lead and that\u2019s one of the biggest differences he\u2019s found campaigning for a higher office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He likens himself as a \u201cfranchisee\u201d of the Conservative \u201cfranchise\u201d in Newmarket-Aurora, as he says are all other candidates in the race for a particular party, and one reason why he hopes to set up a franchise in Aurora\u2019s north riding is leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen I look at my experience growing up, my parents immigrated here in 1974, I was just a kid,\u201d he says. \u201cThey came with $500 – $600 in their pockets, worked in manufacturing jobs, saved enough to buy a small convenience store, saved enough to buy a slightly bigger convenience store, and put my sister and I through university. They instilled in us a sense of hard work, work ethics and I am living the Canadian dream.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He compares his journey to that of Conservative leader Erin O\u2019Toole whose father was an automobile assembly worker, his mother a school teacher, and he rose to become not just a member of the Canadian Armed Forces but a corporate lawyer as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMyself being in financial services as well as having experience on municipal council, I can relate to O\u2019Toole and his leadership qualities,\u201d says Mr. Kim, drawing a contrast to what he says is Liberal leader Justin Trudeau\u2019s \u201celitist\u201d background.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leadership, he says, has to come to the top, and that leadership needs to be demonstrated in an area that is front of mind for most Canadians: recovering from the global pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe cannot necessarily control COVID because it is a biological entity that constantly evolves, but we can control how we deal with it through our government policies,\u201d says Mr. Kim. \u201cTime and time again over the last 16 \u2013 18 months, there hasn\u2019t been a plan by the Liberal government. It seems as though their plans are more reactive than proactive and I think people are concerned about COVID and how the government is dealing with it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cErin O\u2019Toole and the Conservative leadership has a plan to deal with COVID, such as bringing vaccination manufacturing within Canada \u2013 domestic manufacturing. We\u2019re going to incent biopharmaceutical companies to locate and manufacture here in Canada. We need to have a partnership with the United States so that we can have a supply chain\u2026just as we have a supply chain in the automobile industry.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other issues he says he is encountering door-to-door include jobs and the economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are a hard-working, hard-work-ethic community,\u201d he says. \u201c[Residents] are concerned about their jobs and the growth of the economy. The Conservative [platform] plans to create one million jobs over three years. We are going to support families by providing 50 per cent subsidies for jobs they lost for those who have been unemployed for more than six months. Jobs and economy are things that are resonating with Newmarket-Aurora residents and we do have a plan for that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Conservatives, he says, also have a plan for tackling climate change but challenges the Liberal plan of \u201cattaching a tax\u201d on carbon emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Carbon Tax penalizes those people who need to use their vehicles to get to work \u2013 the middle class \u2013 and drives jobs and investment out of the country,\u201d says Mr. Kim. \u201cThe Conservatives have a plan to meet our international targets and reduce carbon emissions by 2030 that doesn\u2019t require Trudeau\u2019s Carbon Tax.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur Climate Change plan includes establishing innovative Personal Low Carbon Savings Accounts to help Canadians make greener lifestyle choices. The program will help Canadians build a lower carbon future with the ability to purchase locally-grown fruits and vegetables, meats and dairy products, transit passes, bicycles and energy-efficient home improvements.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As he looks ahead to residents going to the polls on September 20, Mr. Kim says he has \u201calways known the Conservative Party to be a compassionate party\u201d that \u201crespects people\u2019s rights regardless of race, religion, gender, and sexual orientation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe respect people of all these differences because in a democratic society we have to learn not just to live with one another, but to love one another and appreciate one another for our differences,\u201d he says. \u201cThere is always the misconception that Conservatives are cost-cutters and cutting programs. I don\u2019t believe in that at all because I believe in spending, but the right kind of spending. I believe in investing in people. When you invest in people, there is a return \u2013 it may be three, five, 10 years down the line, but\u2026there is always a return down the road when you invest in people.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir<\/strong>
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/em><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In his two successful bids for a place on Aurora Council, Harold Kim ran on a slogan of \u201cservant leadership,\u201d that is working for and being accountable to the people. Although the Conservative Party has a slogan of its own, this original mantra is close at hand as Mr. Kim hits the campaign trail to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":29865,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/2021-08-26-06.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-7LU","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-16 03:02:07","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29878\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29865"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}